recourse to deterrents. Poland's situation, he said, called for
prudence. Her secular enemy was Germany, with whom it would be
difficult, perhaps impossible, ever to cultivate such terms as would
conciliate her permanently. All the more reason, therefore, to deserve
and win the friendship of her other neighbors, in particular of the
Ruthenians. The Polish plenipotentiary met the argument in the usual
way, where upon the envoy exclaimed: "Well, to make a long story short,
I am here to say that the line of action traced out for your country
emanates from the inflexible will of the Great Powers. To this you must
bend. If it should lead to hostilities on the part of your neighbors you
could, of course, rely on the help of your protectors. Will this not
satisfy you?" "If the protection were real it certainly would. But where
is it? Has it been vouchsafed at any moment since the armistice? Have
the Allied governments an executive in eastern Europe? Are they likely
to order their troops thither to assist any of their protegees? And if
they issued such an order, would it be obeyed? They cannot protect us,
as we know to our cost. That is why we are prepared, in our
interests--also in theirs--to protect ourselves."

This remarkable conversation was terminated by the announcement of the
penalty of disobedience. "If you persist in refusing the proposals I
have laid before you, I am to tell you that the Great Powers will
withdraw their aid from your country and may even feel it to be their
duty to modify the advantageous status which they had decided to confer
upon it." To which this answer was returned: "For the assistance we are
receiving we are and will ever be truly grateful. But in order to
benefit by it the Polish people must be a living organism and your
proposals tend to reduce us to a state of suspended vitality. They also
place us at the mercy of our numerous enemies, the greatest of whom is
Germany."

But lucid intelligence, backed by unflagging will, was of no avail
against the threat of famine. The Poles had to give way. M. Paderewski
pledged his word to Messrs. Lloyd George and Wilson that he would have
an armistice concluded with the Ruthenians of eastern Galicia, and the
Duumvirs rightly placed implicit confidence in his word as in his moral
rectitude. They also felt grateful to him for having facilitated their
arduous task by accepting the inevitable. To my knowledge President
Wilson himself addressed a letter to h